Page 44 - Climate Change

Earth's warmest Aug saw 65 countries set record high temperatures: Report

Thirteen per cent of the Earth's surface, spanning 65 countries, experienced record high temperatures in August, while the rest of the world braved significantly higher temperatures compared to the 1951-1980 average, according to a new analysis conducted by an independent US-based non-profit organisation. Berkeley Earth, which focuses on environmental data science and analysis, said last month was the warmest August since records began to be kept in 1850, with "particularly warm conditions" prevailing in parts of India, Japan, North Atlantic, Eastern Equatorial Pacific, Northern South America, Central America, parts of Africa and the Middle East. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a US government agency, said on Thursday that 2023 witnessed Earth's hottest August in its 174-year climate record. The sizzling month also marked the northern hemisphere's warmest meteorological summer and the southern hemisphere's warmest meteorological winter on record, the NOAA

Extreme weather turns up the heat on long-term investment in agriculture

Rising global temperatures threaten to damage crops that rely on predictable weather, which will likely lead to higher food prices

Oil India to invest Rs 25,000 crore in clean energy for net zero by 2040

State-owned Oil India Ltd plans to invest Rs 25,000 crore in clean energy projects that will help it achieve a net zero carbon emission goal by 2040, its chairman Ranjit Rath said on Thursday. OIL's net zero plan includes a combination of cutting down the flaring of gas and commercialisation of stranded gas as well as setting up renewable electricity generation capacity, building green hydrogen plants and constructing biogas and ethanol plants. The company plans to lay an 80-kilometer pipeline to bring natural gas from fields in Arunachal Pradesh to Assam to help replace polluting liquid fuels in transport as well as industries, he told a news conference. It is also looking to convert some of the pipelines originally built to transport crude oil, to help flow gas, he said. "Our Rs 25,000 crore commitment is for for array of activities including green hydrogen, compressed biogas plants, renewable portfolio. geothermal energy, zero flaring initiative, CCUS projects, and 2G ethanol ..

Underachieving on climate

More action needed from G20 on energy transition

Trillions needed to meet Paris climate goals: G20 under India's presidency

The G20, under India's presidency, on Saturday said that developing countries will need USD 5.9 trillion in the pre-2030 period to implement their national climate plans effectively, with the aim of holding global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, preferably 1.5 degrees Celsius. To achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, developing countries will require approximately USD 4 trillion annually for clean energy technologies by 2030, the bloc said. The G20 also urged developed countries to fulfil their commitment to double their collective adaptation finance provision by 2025, compared to 2019 levels. Comprising nations responsible for 85 per cent of the world's GDP and 80 per cent of emissions, the G20 emphasised the need for increased global investments to align with the goals of the Paris Agreement. They called for a substantial scaling up of investment and climate finance, transitioning from billions to trillions of dollars from all sources. The New Delhi Leaders' Declaration,

European Commission urges G20 to set ambitious climate targets for 2030

The European Commission on Saturday urged G20 countries to agree to global targets on tripling renewable energy capacity and doubling energy efficiency by 2030, seen as critical to limiting the global average temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Addressing the "One Earth" session at the G20 Leaders' Summit in New Delhi here, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen emphasised the urgency of addressing climate change, saying: "Climate change is man-made. So, it means we can fix it." She underscored the disproportionate impact of climate change, noting that G20 countries are responsible for a staggering 80 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, while Africa, with less than 4 per cent of emissions, is among the most affected. The European Commission president reminded the G20 countries that "we are about to miss our objective of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees". "So, it is absolutely critical that we maintain our path of 1.5 degrees. Only what gets measu

G20 leaders call for sustainable growth, addressing climate challenge

As the world's top leaders assembled here for the G20 Summit, they called for an urgent need to tackle various challenges before the globe including on the climate front. UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said the G20 leaders came together for the first time 15 years ago to restore global growth after the financial crisis. "We (now) meet at a time of enormous challenges - the world is looking to the G20 once again to provide leadership. Together I believe we can address these challenges," he said. Brazilian President Luiz Incio Lula da Silva said during his country's G20 presidency, it will launch a Task Force for Global Mobilisation against Climate Change. "We want to reach COP 30, in 2025, with a climate agenda balanced between mitigation, adaptation, loss and damage and financing, ensuring the sustainability of the planet and the dignity of people," he said. He said Brazil hopes to count on everyone's engagement so that the beauty of the Earth is not just a "photograph seen from ..

World off track to curb global warming, but offers ways to fix: UN report

With the world far off track on its 2015 pledge to curb global warming, a new United Nations report central to upcoming climate negotiations details how quickly and deeply energy and financial systems must change to get back on a safer path. The window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all is rapidly closing, Friday's report warned. The globe has to cut its emissions of heat-trapping gases by 43% by 2030, compared to 2019 levels, and 60% by 2035, the report said. To get there, the report said, the phase-out of unabated fossil fuels is required, using a phrase international climate negotiators have shied away from before. It also said phasing out the internal combustion engine would be a huge help. And the way money flows such as investments, subsidies, loans, grants and payments for people and places hurt by warming's extreme weather also has to change, the report recommended. It said countries need to stop USD 450 billion in annual subsidies for coal,

Global emissions not in line to achieve Paris Agreement goals: UN report

A UN report on Friday said that global emissions are not in line with the modelled global mitigation pathways consistent with the temperature goal of the Paris Agreement -- a legally binding international treaty on climate change. The Global Stocktake report of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), however, said there is a rapidly narrowing window to raise ambitions and implement existing commitments in order to limit warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. It said much more ambition in action and support is needed in implementing domestic mitigation measures and setting larger targets in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC). Global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions need to be reduced by 43 per cent by 2030 and further by 60 per cent by 2035 compared to 2019 levels and reach net zero CO2 emissions by 2050 globally, the report said, adding that creativity and innovation in policymaking across all sectors and systems, and international cooperation

High-income nations of G20 fall drastically short on climate action: Oxfam

Even if the high-income G20 countries, including the US, the UK, Australia and Germany, were to reduce their domestic emissions to zero by 2030, they would still fall significantly short of their fair-share benchmarks for emissions reduction, according to a new paper published by Oxfam International. The paper by the global non-governmental organisation evaluates the fairness and ambition of national greenhouse gas reduction targets, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), of the G20 countries, using three distinct approaches. These approaches were employed to gauge the strength of the conclusions drawn. If all approaches arrived at similar results, it would suggest that the conclusions were robust. The findings reveal that the G20, collectively as well as the most high-income countries of the bloc individually, are failing to meet the necessary levels of ambition required to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The gap between the collective NDCs o

Lowest emission nations hit hardest by heat in June-Aug period: Analysis

Countries with the lowest historical emissions experienced three to four times higher than seasonal temperatures this June-August days than G20 countries, according to an analysis conducted by an independent US-based group of scientists using a metric called the Climate Shift Index (CSI). The three-month June-August 2023 season was the warmest on record globally and the analysis by Climate Central indicates that human-caused climate change made the unprecedented heat far more likely across the globe. CSI measures how often and how much temperatures have shifted from the historical average. A higher index indicates more dramatic changes compared to the past. The CSI levels above 1 indicate climate change, while levels between 2 and 5 mean that climate change made those temperatures between two to five times more likely. During the June-August period, nearly half (48 per cent) of the world's population experienced at least 30 days with a CSI level 3 or higher, Climate Central said in

How carbon emissions accounting helps in achieving net zero targets

The process of calculating the amount of greenhouse gas emitted directly by operations or indirectly by supply chain and subsidiaries is known as carbon accounting

US Prez Biden to focus on progress on climate at G20 Summit: White House

The key focus areas for President Joe Biden at the G20 Summit include delivering for developing nations, making progress on key issues like climate, technology and reshaping the multilateral development banks, the White House has said, expressing hope that the bloc will be able to make headway on those topics under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's leadership. On Thursday, President Biden will travel to New Delhi to attend the G20 Leaders' Summit. On Friday, President Biden will participate in a bilateral meeting with Prime Minister Modi and on Saturday and Sunday, the President will participate in the official sessions of the G20 Summit. As Biden heads to the G20, he is committed to working with emerging market partners to deliver big things together, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said during a press briefing on Tuesday. "That's what we believe the world will see in New Delhi this weekend," he said. America's commitment to the G20 has not wavered, and it hopes the G20 Summi

Ahead of G20 summit, India dodges mixing human rights with climate agenda

Combining the two issues may make finding consensus in the group's final communique difficult

Time to have global conversation about carbon tax on polluters: Kenya prez

Climate change is relentlessly eating away at Africa's economic progress and it's time to have a global conversation about a carbon tax on polluters, Kenya's president declared Tuesday as the first Africa Climate Summit got underway. Those who produce the garbage refuse to pay their bills, President William Ruto, a host of the summit, said to an audience that included senior officials from China, the United States and the European Union - some of the world's largest emitters of greenhouse gases. The rapidly growing African continent of more than 1.3 billion people is losing 5% to 15% of its gross domestic product growth every year to the widespread impacts of climate change, according to Ruto. It's a source of deep frustration in the resource-rich region that contributes by far the least to global warming. He and other leaders urged reforms to the global financial structures that have left African nations paying about five times more to borrow money than others, worsening the debt .

De-hyping climate change

We need hybrid solutions to adapt to climate change, not panic-driven funding of net-zero goals

World losing race to meet climate change commitments: COP28 president

The summit, which opened on Monday, is focused on mobilising financing for Africa's response to climate change

Current climate policies not enough to meet Paris targets: Lancet study

Attempts to pursue "green growth" in high-income countries will not deliver the emission reductions required to meet the climate targets and fairness principles of the Paris Agreement, according to a study. The study, published recently in The Lancet Planetary Health journal, shows that if current trends continue, even the 11 high-income countries that have "decoupled" carbon emissions from gross domestic product (GDP) growth would on average take over 200 years to get their emissions close to zero. These countries would emit more than 27-times their fair share of the "global carbon budget" that must not be exceeded if we are to avert catastrophic warming beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius, as required by the Paris Agreement. The researchers argue that the pursuit of economic growth in high-income countries is at odds with internationally agreed climate targets, and call for transformative "post-growth" climate policy centred around sufficiency, fairness, and wellbeing. The study compared

Farmers' incomes are key for boosting food security

Why enabling small-scale farmers to participate in food value chains can lead to rural prosperity

The impact of food on climate

The problem is that there are two distinct agricultural worlds